Hectic day

It's Friday already and Patrick's parents are coming tonight! Since Monday, I promised myself to clean the house and get everything ready but I hadn't done a thing until today. I do have good reasons though. I had terrible allergies this week. I got it a bit last year around this time but this year it's bad. My eyes were blood shot red and my nose is either runny or stuffy. I look and feel groggy. I got some meds and it seemed to have helped a bit but I don't feel normal. I was also stuck absorbed in a series of books this week. I read a review in TIME magazine about Stephanie Meyer and her book, Twilight and its series. It's a Young Adult Fiction. The writing wasn't impressive, the details aren't there, and the romance, although some parts were interesting, was generally yucky. But I couldn't put it down and the 3 books which occupied my time while everything else, including my husband and kids went ignored.... I am glad that I am done with that for now.

To my surprise this week, I finally got a hold of the CD version of Barack Obama's "Audacity of Hope" from the library. I read the book a few months before, when he was introduced on Oprah - yeah, I read some of the books she introduces.... The book was a little too difficult for me to follow at times. Unlike his first book - Dreams from My Father - this one focused more on Washington, politics, media, campaign, elections, government. But when I heard that the audio version won a Grammy, I had to see what that was about. I've never heard a book on CD so I was just curious. I still don't understand what makes an award winning audio book. But I decided that I do like listening to the author read his own book. Barack Obama has become a great companion in the kitchen while I feed Sierra or cook dinner. He's also good to be with while I drive to the grocery store or run errands. But best of all, he really brought Washington to life, making government interesting, humorous, and personal. The message in his book is basically what he is bringing to his campaign trail now and it's good to see that consistency.

Despite my seemingly enthusiastic support for Obama, I am actually a flip flopper. At times, I tell Patrick not to vote in the general election if Hillary Clinton were to win the Democratic Nomination. He tells me that's impossible; that he's a democrat and will vote for a democrat this time no matter who the nominee (whatever...). But then at times, I see her on TV and think that she would make a great president. She may be a bit nasty now, but she is campaigning. At the end of the day, if she were to get the job, I think she will, or at least try very hard to do what she said she will do. I use to wonder why voters couldn't make decisions. Now I understand. And I am not even an American.

I use to think that I would probably never become a citizen of this country. I didn't see the point and to change one's citizenship is a pretty big deal. Not that I am at all patriotic to my own country. In fact, probably quite the opposite. I don't know much about the values of my country, and I probably don't quite fit in nicely to society there. But it's a citizenship that I was born with - wait a minute, on a second though, I was born Chinese, and Japanese is my second citizenship. Anyway, I think that now, there is possibility of switching over. I am more closely tied to this country and the people here than anywhere. Japan is a country of my childhood. I think America may be the country of the rest of my life.

Back to cleaning!